


ties that bind

by alea_archivist (the_aleator)



Series: A Mere Appendix [5]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (1984 TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Angst, F/M, Friendship, Grief, Hiatus, Hurt No Comfort, One-Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:20:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22820872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_aleator/pseuds/alea_archivist
Summary: Grief binds them all together. Or how the Lestrades look after Watson during the Hiatus.
Relationships: Lestrade & John Watson
Series: A Mere Appendix [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1636375
Kudos: 6
Collections: Watson's Woes JWP Entries: 2013





	ties that bind

Mrs. Elen Lestrade looked at her doorstep disapprovingly, and then swung the door open to admit the two men on her doorstep. By the look on her husband’s face, he knew quite well the trouble that he should be in later, but for now she swung the door shut behind them, and said as brightly as she dared,

“Would you care for tea, gentleman?” Her husband had the decency to color, and she quirked an eyebrow at him as he attempted to lever Dr. Watson’s arm more fully over his narrow shoulders. The aforementioned doctor looked quite past the state of flushed and into the state of rip-roaringly sozzled, and his head swung sideways rather freely.

“Forgive me, my dear, but I didn’t think I should bring him home. Not as he is, leastways.” Lestrade whispered, hefting his arm about the doctor’s waist in attempt to keep him upright. Elen sighed, then let her maternal side take over.

“I suppose not.” She said, taking the doctor's other side and making for the stairs. "Not with all the grief in his house." She muttered fiercely, with one sideways glance at the tired lines and weary pouches of Doctor Watson's face. She had quite a liking for Mrs. John Watson, and what a sorry fate, that she and the babe should both slip away.  
  
Not much to live for, but the continual donning of black, day after day wore on a man's spirit until he was little more than a ghost, wandering in the streets in starched collar and cuffs, hidden behind an all consuming dark silence. It was more than a pity, that a good man like Dr. Watson should suffer so, but then, so had Job, and he had learned much from his suffering.  
  
They laid him on the bed with the care of experienced parents, and her husband eased one slim hand to his back as he stood upright. The countenance of the man staring back at her was not so different from the one on the bed, with the lines that life had given them etched into their very souls as much as their faces.

“Go off to bed, Mr. Lestrade. I shall see to him.” Lestrade tilted his head to one side to study her, then Watson, with his dark eyes as she crossed her arms. He took a pace closer to her, laying one hand on top of her and said softly,

“He isn’t one of your boys that you can nurse and care for, and keep away his grief.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?” She said tartly, more tartly than she should, feeling that hidden reservoir of grief re-surging in her breast. There had been nothing they could have done for their eldest son. Nothing she could have done. That was what hurt most. “But there is something owed between us and Dr. Watson, is there not? You least of all shouldn’t forget that, Garvan.” She said pointedly.

“No.” He admited, to the darkness more than to her, and with a look of hidden compassion, he squeezed her hand. “Of course not.” He said and shut the door quietly behind him.

Elen eased off the man’s shoes and out of his jacket, and marveled that the skills of a nurse were so slow to leave her as she skillfully maneuvered the cover over him. Standing by his bedside for a moment, she turned to leave, only to hear a slurred voice behind her, cry out

“Mary.”

It is the intimate cry of grief, and she turned back to the bed, and cradled the doctor’s hand in hers. Funny how grief should be a tie that bound them together, she to Mrs. Watson and Dr. Watson to her husband, and Dr. Watson to her. All different sorrows, but much of the same root, showing different leaves here and there, but sprouted of the same tree, and bearing the same ill symptoms on all it touched.

Neither can she say to Dr. Watson how soon it will be over and the hurt eased, as time does, for death so often reaches beyond the grave. She laid the hand back on the coverlet, and left resolutely for the door, shutting it behind her with a quiet click in the hallway.

She did not look back.

But her hand touched gently to her womb, and she shut her eyes swiftly against the bite of tears, alone in the darkness.

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: for JWP#11 - Ladies' Night at Watson's Woes 2013. This is a series for Lestrade that I have bits and pieces of, but I've never finished.


End file.
